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Home health programs recognized in November

Month is National Home Care and Hospice Month

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Baxter Regional Home Health patient James Schad (right) gets a handshake from state Rep. Nelda Speaks on Thursday. Speaks visited Schad in recognition of November being National Home Care and Hospice Month.(Photo: Scott Liles/The Baxter Bulletin)Buy Photo

State Rep. Nelda Speaks of Mountain Home made a house call Thursday, visiting the home of one her constituents in recognition of National Home Care and Hospice Month.

Speaks and several Baxter Regional Home Health representatives traveled to the home of James Schad of Mountain Home on Thursday morning, catching the Home Health patient finishing up his breakfast.

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Schad is one of about 300 patients that Baxter Regional Home Health visits each week in Baxter and Marion counties, Home Health Director Janie Pugsley said. Counting full-time and PRN staff, the program has about 34 nurses and they make in-home visits every day of the year.

“I’m a hands-on person, so this was a good experience for me,” she said. “It gives you an idea about what you will be voting for in the Legislature.”

The Baxter Regional Home Health program offers “everything short of chemotherapy” as in-home services, Pugsley said. Wound care, intravenous antibiotics, skilled observation and chronic disease medication monitoring are all services included in the program.

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State Rep. Nelda Speaks (far right) visits with (from left) Merilou Rohm, James Schad and Wanda Bollinger on Thursday in the living room of Schad's house in Mountain Home.(Photo: Scott Liles/The Baxter Bulletin)

“One of the biggest obstacles (to patients receiving home health services) is that people don’t want other people inside their house,” Pugsley said. “Maybe they didn’t make their bed, or their house is a little cluttered. But once they start receiving home health visits and they see what we can do, they are always happy to have a nurse that is able to visit them in their house.”

According to the National Association for Home Care and Hospice, Medicare pays nearly $2,000 per day for a typical hospital stay and about $450 per day for a typical nursing home stay. By comparison, home care often costs less than $100 per day and allows the patient to recover at home.

“One of the aims of home health is to keep patients out of their doctor’s office,” Pugsley said. “The more you can treat them at home, the more you can keep them away from flu bugs and other sick people, the better off they are.”

Baxter Regional Home Health visits each patient at least once a week, and often more frequently depending on the individual patient’s needs. The program tries to have the same nurses visit the same patients as often as possible.

“When you see the same patient, you build up a rapport with them,” Pugsley said. “They can take one look at a patient and know that something is not right with them.”

For more information on the Baxter Regional Home Health program, please call (870) 435-7500.